The last 3 games I've played have all been future classics (NV, ME2 and Portal 2) so I found this one a bit shit at first. But once I got over that it's actually quite fun, although it does feel like a waste of time.

that TF2, arguably the best PC FPS of this generation, is now free to play- forever. Simply download it off Steam (be warned that such have been the free updates Valve have lavished on it since its inception 4 years ago, it's absolutely massive- however most machines including Macs should be able to cope with it on one setting or another.)

still slogging through. Its fun, but such a throw nback in terms of design.. When you are running through a place for the first time, without using a guide and working through the map its certainly exhilarating.

Played some of the Uncharted 3 beta too, a bit laggy but lots of potential.

It's absolutely fantastic. All hotting up at the minute, just finished the Shadow Broker bit and have only got one squad position left to fill. Think I'm about to plough Miranda as well, would prefer Kelly frankly.

I realised this when I bought Oblivion and wanted to hang myself after four hours of dicking about in a dungeon then riding a horse around a field, ocassionally getting off to stab a dog.

In saying this, do you think me getting Mass Effect is a good idea? Because like I say, I always like the sound of RPGs, then when I play them they've been uniformly repetitive and surprpisingly unimaginative.

Although that is essentially what it is, the battle system is like a classic shooter (which I struggle with frankly) but there is a hell of a lot of story and dialogue to wade through which I'm really enjoying. It's very immersive but I get the impression you can do as much or as little of that side of things as you want really.

although I'm starting to question why really. I'm constantly getting killed by kids who have been on it for months and have all the best guns, know the best hiding spots etc. Anyone know if there's a more fun bit of online play that I'm missing? I might just move on to Undead...

recently, so am flogging that on ebay, and have got (i had about 3 years sans 360) Bioshock, Mass Effect and Fallout 3 (may add Alan Wake & Assassins Creed to that, depending on how much LA Noire goes for) which should keep me busy.
Really liked the end to LA Noire.

Someone else used to do this I recall - Bammers, was it? It's better when a few different people start it up I reckon...

ANYHOW, not been too much news this week.

Lots of developers say they like the Wii U and will develop for it. Note, this isn't news, but is about all that anyone has to say about it right now.

Ape Escape gets resurrected for PS3 and is apparently woeful. A real shame, as the first one was one of my favourite platformers ever and made the best use of that second Sony analogue stick to date.

Skyward Sword plot details leak. It'll apparently be a kind of prequel to OOTime and you'll meet Zelda before she's a Princess. Therefore, shouldn't Link be about 2 years old in it?

Eurogamer reevaluates Metroid Prime on the Gamecube, saying they wish you could skip bosses. It provokes an interesting piece about should players have the right to skip sections of games that are too hard? They have after all paid for that product.

I haven't played it, but this link in the comments is the best thing I've read about gaming in ages. It pretty much calls out the Japanese writer of the story for being a misogynist and says it's a damning assessment of his views on women given how highly regarded Samus Aran is as an icon.

Lots of people are rereleasing old games in HD thinking that this will be enough to keep their fans happy. Does anybody REALLY want to replay the Splinter Cell or mid-cycle RE games THAT much?

On the subject of RE games, Mercenaries first 15 minute leaks and it looks relentless. Relentless, a bit dull and nothing at ALL like a RE game. Which brings me nicely on to...

SUB-THREAD:

I had Saturday to myself so plugged in my mate's Gamecube controller and settled down to the RE remake. Very good innit? At times I got a bit pissed off at the controls and back tracking but conversely, I preferred it's more desolate atmosphere over RE4. It also changes all the puzzles and makes things occur at times when (if you remember the original) you least expect them to. For example, those blasted dogs didn't jump at when I thought they would. And when they eventually did ,I leaped about 3 foot in the air.

Both this and RE4 are good games, but so different that it did make me wonder if RE has lost what made it so great and has turned into a fairly average shooter series. The last great one was 4, which was years ago now.

Where should they go next?
What's your favourite RE title?
Do you still care about the franchise?
Do they need to wrap up the ludicrous story and - I can't believe I'm saying this - reboot it?

I saw the Eurogamer article. Surely one of the main points of the Metroid games is the boss battles? If you preferred the back and forth exploration and upgrading, there was always the easy mode, in which you could pretty much defeat all the bosses first go anyway.

UNTIL what I presume was the last level when you have to do them ALL AT FUCKING ONCE. IN A ROW.

Fuck you Capcom.

Got to about number 4, gave up and am so rubbish at it now it's never going to happen.

Similarly, the very VERY final boss of Sin & Punishment 2 has beaten me. You have to chain together about 400 reverse missile attacks to save your companion and after 10 minutes of solid, eye bleeding play I'd only taken half his health off. Fucking impossible and that was only on medium difficulty.

As a massive massive fan of the franchise (bought a dreamcast just for RE:CV, bought a gamecube just for 4 - they ended up being multi platform anyway the bastards). I would like to see them stop what they're doing and go back to the more survival horror type stuff.

I'd like something condemned-esque, in the respect that it was absolutely terrifying and actually playable.

RE5 was too much of a shooter. The mechanics of the game don't allow for that to work too well, and if they go further down that over-the-shoulder shooter route they'll just be making Gears of War with zombies. If they can split the difference between the earlier games and 4 and create a creepy atmosphere occassionally punctuated with big action set pieces I'd be happy.

I think either 2 or Code Veronica is actually my favourite. I haven't played CV in years though; that's one of the few HD remakes I'm actually looking forward to.

So we got proper pwned by some proper unsportmen-like cunts on 1Flag capture on Powerhouse on Tuesday (they basically hogged all the good weapons, and waited til the last second to cap the flag and basically dicked us over) so rather than let them constantly kill and teabag us all, we decided to not play, and just jumped off the map and suicided over and over again. Petty? Yes. Funny? You bet.

over 4 rounds. They knew the map, they had all the weapons faster than us, completely outclassed - it wasn't even a match, just an arse-kicking. I'm not a fan of rage quitting, much rather make the game as unenjoyable for them as they're making it for us.

The weekly is to complete a level in 12 minutes on Legendary? Yeah we tried that - you can't do it as a team though, needs to be single player only. Well lame. Apparently it's possible to do Nightfall in 6 minutes or something.

I'm dead excited about having a meaty new game to play. Also, it means that I can hide away in the bedroom playing it loads, my GF has a friend coming to stay for a couple of months. The thing is though, I haven't played the others. Is it really essencial to have played the others first?

52 hours clocked up. Could have done more - but the running about on Pulse was fun for only so long.

Kinda feel a bit weird. Didn't rate it as a great FF game; and at times it was positively tedious. But whenever I got into a two/three-hour session towards the game's end I found myself unable to stop, totally compelled to get to the next save point, to see what's around that bend, what happens after this boss fight. Which I guess is the sign of a good game.

Thought the end was elegant. The final, final, FINAL boss was a joke, though; kicked that douchbag's face to pieces in about a minute and a half. LAME, Square, LAME.

...I am well over halfway through LA Noire. Kinda lost a bit of enthusiasm after the SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT end of the homocide cases, and vice isn't doing it for me. The SPOLIER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT boxer case was Zzzzz... though the spurting blood was LOL compared to the graphical excellence elsewhere.

I thought it did a really good job of going back to it's roots... have no idea what the 3D modes plays like though but Generations 2D sidescroller seems infinity superior to Sonic 4 and I'm kind of excited by it now :)

The GTA Classics Pack for £5. I'd pay that much just for the ability to play a Windows 7-compatible copy of GTA2, let alone GTAs III, Vice City, and San Andreas. I used to love GTA2 as a kid. Pretty pleased really.

Right now I'm trying to decide whether I can really be bothered with FM2011 for a tenner. The past few times I've tried to start games of FM2010 I've gotten bored and given up before the first season friendlies are even over. Probably not then. Plants vs. Zombies is £2.37 at the moment though, might give that a bash.

Also I finished Mass Effect 2 today, a bit disappointed with the ending frankly, spend ages assembling a team and gaining their loyalty for the actual main storyline mission to take a couple of hours or so. Still a great game but I thought it was going to be a real epic.